Opinion: #KeepTheChangeBae and the risks of brand trolling

by Olufemi Babalogbon

It is a sensational story, hilarious too.

An 18-year-old guy in Ibadan spent N3, 800 hanging out with a babe. When she did not agree to a relationship, he took to twitter to harass her. She paid him back N5, 000 for the stress and told him to keep the change. Then the whole twitter got into the frenzy of taunting hashtags: #5kbae and #KeepTheChangeBae. And yes, it has been trending for days!

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What was more exciting was not the trolling of the two young people by regular twitter handles, but the trolling by corporate brands, which includes banks, e-commerce firms, betting agencies and beauty studios. At the end of the day, every tweet which was to go viral had to carry the hashtag #keepthechangebae as this would give the tweet more visibility and reach.  One can say statistically that the hashtag superimposed and exceeded the performance of sponsored-with-thousands-of-dollars hashtags such as #bbnaija within the 24 hours of its hyper-trend. In fact as at 12noon on Friday, March 31st, 2017, #keepthechangebae has a reach of 2.8 Million while #bbnaija has a reach of 1.2 Million, according to a metric tool, keyhole.co.

Talking about the brand which benefited most, it would be a 72-year-old bank with more branches in Ibadan than the rest of the country. The team behind her social media instantly churned out creative contents and imageries, attempting to bring out the humour in the #keepthechangebae debate. From the brand-trolling, the bank got 1, 610 retweets and 426 favourites. Prior to the breaking of #keepthechangebae, the twitter handle never had more than 10 retweets in a day! Brand Trolling is becoming a global strategy. Last February Royal Jordanian airline trolled Donald Tump with their Ban/Bon Voyage ad on facebook, twitter and instagram – spinning the blocked Trump’s travel ban on seven Muslim-majority countries into some damn creative contents.

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Urban Dictionary defines Trolling as: “Typically unleashing one or more cynical or sarcastic remarks on an innocent by-stander, because it’s the internet”. It ranges from individuals trying to be sassy or controversial, to corporate brands leveraging on controversies to generate traction and social media awareness. Controversies have more reach than the conversations sponsored with dollars, and so a tactical leverage on the controversy can get brand contents the traction needed to generate higher returns on marketing (ROM). Remember #LeaveTrashForLawma?

As interesting and profiting Brand Trolling may be, it is a risky game – one that requires you to be as cunning as a fox and as swift as an eagle. Your choice to troll, as a corporate brand, should depend on the psychographics of your target customers and your Brand-DNA. It may turn out good for your brand, if you are targeting the social media-savvy, smartphone-toting, pop culture-driven youths and if your brand has leanings towards fun, adventure or entertainment. If you taunt the wrong target or the timing is apolitical, your brand may end up getting vitriolic attacks which may have far-reaching consequences. Beyond the fear of negative consequences, the question brands need to answer is: How ethical is Brand Trolling and how do we define the extremes?
Olufemi Babalogbon, a marketing communications/business strategist, writes from Lagos and can be contacted on twitter via @Babalowise.

 

 

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